The Crown's Game (The Crown's Game, #1)(27)

The very corner of Nikolai’s mouth smiled. But only the corner.

Renata reached up and brushed her finger against his dimple. She had always told him it looked like an accidental divot chipped out of the smooth planes of his face, for he only had one, not a matching pair. “There. I missed this dimple. This is a tiny bit of the Nikolai I know.” Her finger stayed for an extra second before it dropped away.

Nikolai tried not to think about the way she lingered. Instead, he tugged at his collar, where the scar seemed to threaten to burn through his cravat.

He could reface all the buildings on Nevsky Prospect as part of his move. Superficially, it would be a pretty gift to the city for Pasha’s birthday, and hopefully the tsar would appreciate the effort it would take to execute such detailed splendor.

It had to be more than just beautiful buildings, though. But what? Something to help himself in the Game.

Nevsky Prospect was the main thoroughfare through Saint Petersburg. Nikolai didn’t know where the girl was living, but surely she would make appearances on the street or in the shops there with relative frequency, wouldn’t she? Most of Saint Petersburg did.

Gargoyles! he thought. He could install gargoyles or something else discreet on the buildings, and then they could take care of the girl. If stone soldiers did the dirty work, it wasn’t really Nikolai killing her. Was it?

“Nikolai?” Renata asked.

He broke away from his planning. He’d forgotten Renata was still there.

“Yes?”

“You looked . . . like you’d been enveloped by a storm cloud.”

“Sorry.” He charmed an apple tart to float to him, and he ate it, although he didn’t pay enough attention to taste it.

“So you’re all right?”

Nikolai brushed a stray flake of pastry off his collar. “No, I’m not all right. I’m not sure I’ll ever be. But I’ll do what I have to. It’s what I’ve always done.”





CHAPTER SEVENTEEN


Vika dreamed that they were at Tikho Mountain, just outside Bolshebnoie Duplo again. It was hushed and hot outside, and so bright she could hardly see as she squinted in the white light. The tsar and his Guard had not yet arrived, so it was only Vika, Father, Galina, and the other enchanter. Vika stood in her shimmering shroud; her opponent was a silhouette, just as he had been before.

In the background, Galina had set up a small table, complete with lace cloth, several fine china dishes, and a set for tea. She nibbled on a croissant spread with strawberry jam.

Father pulled out a chair, its legs somehow squawking on the dirt of Tikho Mountain. He winked at Vika—the kind of wink that only worked in dreams—as if he knew the squawking would irk his sister. “I don’t know how you can eat those pastries.” He wrinkled his nose at his sister’s croissant. “Have you any black bread?”

Galina cringed. “Honestly, why you insist on pretending you are ordinary country folk, I’ll never understand.”

“And why you insist on being so pretentious,” Sergei said, “I will never understand.”

Not far from Vika but out of Galina’s earshot, the other enchanter chuckled quietly under his breath. His shoulders shook with laughter, and his shadow top hat tumbled onto the ground. It turned immediately from black to brown from the puff of dust.

How did dirt cling to a shadow, when the shadow wasn’t really there?

Vika reached down to pick up the hat. It felt real in her hands, like silk and ribbon and rounded edges, and yet, it felt like nothing was there at all. It weighed as much as reality, and as little as fantasy.

She wondered what would happen if she put his hat on her head. Even just in her hands, his hat—his power—warmed her, like mulled cider on a winter’s day.

And then she wondered what would happen if she touched the shadow boy himself. If she ran a finger along the sharp line of his jaw. If she touched the scar beneath his collarbone. If she pressed her mouth against his shadow lips . . .

She flushed hot at the thought. Much, much hotter than mulled cider.

And then Vika bolted awake. The sun had just begun its upward creep into the sky, but the scar throbbed against her skin as if only just branded inside the wooden caves of Bolshebnoie Duplo. Oh, thank goodness it was the heat of the wands, not the heat of blush and infatuation, that had seeped into her dream. She was not as silly as her subconscious would suggest.

And then she realized that if her scar was burning . . . the Game!

Vika leaped off the sofa on which she slept—after several days in Saint Petersburg, she was still not accustomed to the luxury of the mattress in the bedroom and much preferred the sofa—and scanned the third-floor flat she had rented on Nevsky Prospect. The scar flared again, which meant it was her turn. The other enchanter had made his move, and although Vika didn’t know what it was, she was immediately on guard. Sergei had warned her that his sister’s student was likely trained as a killer. He’d try to end the Game quickly.

Was the front door locked? Yes.

Any movement in the drawing room: in the corners, under the card table, behind the chaise longue? No.

Was there magic in the air?

Yes.

Vika’s heart thundered in her chest, but she tried to breathe as quietly as she could.

She crept down the hallway toward the rest of the apartment. She’d used the money she found in Sergei’s hiding spot (under the valerian root in his garden) to pay for the flat. It was small by Saint Petersburg standards, but twice the living space she and Sergei had at home. And it had seemed perfect when she found it, full of eccentric mementos from the owners’ trips abroad, some so strange—like the taxidermied elk head wearing a Viking helmet or the garishly colored Venetian mask with mouths where the eye holes should be—that it seemed possible they were enchanted themselves.